{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/805",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 805,
    "subject": "Caraboo-boo?",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1998-06-16T00:06:21+00:00",
    "last": "1998-06-16T00:06:21+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0014-0011@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "William H. Ansley",
        "address": "wansley at warwick.net"
      },
      "date": "1998-06-16T00:06:21+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Caraboo-boo?",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Robert Borski wrote:\n[There is a parallel to this with the-thing Marsch shoots, but\nwhich doesn't die right away, prolonging its mortal coil shuffling until\nmid-morph; hence its double-pupiled eyes, the surmised nictitating effect\nspeculated upon by Marsch being totally bogus.]"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "I really don't agree with the \"morphing carabao\" theory. What is it\nmorphing to? Are any four-eyed forms of life on St. Anne (or St. Croix)\nmentioned? If it isn't turning into a four-eyed form of life (hey! four\neyes!) then why would it have an even partially four-eyed intermediate form.\n\nMarsch says nothing about any \"nictitating effect\". The passage goes:\n\n-------------------------\nEven there the skull was so massive that the bullet had failed to penetrate\ncompletely; so that the animal had probably been alive for a good part of\nthe time while I was pacing off the distance to it; there seemed to have\nbeen a heavy flow of lachrymal fluid that left broad wet steaks in the dust\nbeneath each eye. I lifted one of the eyelids with my finger after I had\nlooked at the wound and noticed that the eyes were double-pupiled, like\nthose of certain Terrestrial fish; the lower segment of one eye moved\nslightly when I touched it with my finger, indicating that the animal may\nhave been hanging on even then. The double pupils don't seem characteristic\nof most life here; so I suppose they must be an adaptation induced by the\ncreature's largely aquatic habits.\n-------------------------\n\nThe \"Terrestrial fish\" Marsch mentions exist. I can't remember either their\ncommon or scientific name at the moment, unfortunately. They have eyes\nsegmented horizontally, with two pupils. They float partly out of the\nwater, the dividing line between their eye segments aligned with the\ndividing line between water and air. This way they can see above (in the\nair) and below (in the water) at the same time. This is handy as they can\nhunt for prey and avoid predators simultaneously. This explains Marsch's\nfinal remarks.\n\nIf the thing *is* a shape shifter I think the best evidence for this is\nthat it is weeping while dying. The \"heavy flow of lachrymal fluid\" is\ntears. I don't think this is definitive; our eyes water for many reasons\nwhen we are not sad, so the fact that an animal seems to be crying is no\nproof that it is experiencing sadness.\n\nWhat I find most striking here is Marsch's offhand cruelty and \"scientific\"\ncoldness. He goes up to an animal that seems to have been in tears which he\ntakes as evidence that it died slowly (and quite possibly painfully,\nalthough he doesn't seem to consider this). And what does he do? Pulls up\nits eyelid and pokes it in the eye! The fact that its eye moves, even\nslightly, doesn't seem to bother him, either.\n\nHis behavior also seems rather stupid and dangerous. If *I* thought a\nlarge, powerful animal that I had just shot might not be quite dead, I\nwould avoid poking it in the eye for fear that might provoke it into\nkicking me in the head, if it still could. Of course, this can certainly be\nascribed to Marsch's lack of training for living in the wild.\n\nIt does seem as if there is some deeper meaning to this episode, but I\ndon't think that providing evidence of shape shifting is it.\n\nWilliam Ansley"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}